


Birthright

by mangacrack



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: First Meetings, Gen, Sailing To Valinor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-10
Updated: 2019-12-10
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:21:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21746689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mangacrack/pseuds/mangacrack
Summary: "Despite the many battles that could have ended my life or all the other choices that could have led my journey anywhere but here, our path crossed anyway."
Comments: 9
Kudos: 58





	Birthright

Their meeting is fated to happen, hence the reason why they both never sought out the other. To avoid attention and unnecessary gossip, they drift towards one another until they are introduced one evening. Their host has little idea what lies behind the meaningful glances. Since the setting allows them to retreat, they silently agree on to have the following conversation in privacy.

Neither Elrond nor Nerdanel utter a single word as they walk through the huge garden until they reach a small and overgrown pond. No one shall disturb them here, they are far enough the music has faded into a whisper. Time stretches on as they wait for the other to begin a conversation. There is a need for one, but all they have of each other are expectations. Wild, outrageous and possibly very untrue. It would take a long time to unravel them all.

Since his arrival, he had learned Lady Nerdanel to be a reclusive woman, who only showed up to show off her art everyone in a while, because otherwise, people would not leave her alone. Elrond doubts she will speak to him unless he prompts her.

"It is strange to finally meet you. I never imagined it would happen, though it remained in the realm of possibilities," he says. The dark pond is silent, not a single ripple disturbs the water. "Despite the many battles that could have ended my life or all the other choices that could have led my journey anywhere but here, our path crossed anyway."

For a moment Elrond believes Lady Nerdanel won't answer. She is known to be stubborn - and silent. It's rare these days for her to speak outside the bare necessities.

"I always hoped I never had to meet you at all," she finally speaks up. Her gaze remains in the pond. The trees over their heads shelters them from the moon and the starlight. Elrond's sharp eyes catch how her hands briefly clench into fists. "The names of two children taken into Maedhros' and Maglor's care were just another outlandish tale I refused to believe. More so than the other since this story carried horror beyond all else that reached my ears until that point. After hearing what Fëanáro's creations did to Princess Elwing, I lived alone for many years. I refused to meet anyone."

Thousand years of practice allows Elrond to hide his reaction. From the very beginning, he fought the seed of hope that he would have a kindred spirit in Nerdanel. Even before his arrival in Valinor, he learned that the Elleth wasn't rumoured to be a kind person, nor a particularly happy soul. During the War of Wrath, he asked after her, on Maglor's and Maedhros' behalf.

Finarfin's answer had been bleak. A short, dismayed shake of his head and the refusal to elaborate further.

His fathers had, Elrond is forced to admit, a truer view on the situation than Elrond himself. He doesn't blame himself and embraces the knowledge that this woman will never be his grandmother. The child he used to be, longed for a mother figure and looked at his many distant relations for a possible choice. Idril and Nimloth he disregarded from the very beginning. They had been too wrapped up in the events that lead to the kinslaying in Sirion and didn't seem like a wise choice. Of the mortal women, he is related to he knew little of, Elenwë had been dead too long, Luthien is figure difficult to relate to and Queen Melian had abandoned her people.

Nerdanel, loving mother of seven sons, had been untouched by the tragedies of Elrond's life. She had not been a historical figure, an untouchable ruler that once basked in the light of the stars or a fallen hero. Therefore she had been simply a _person_ to him.

He should have known that Fëanor's wife had been left unaffected by the sands of time.

As healer, he saw a woman with many unresolved issues in her heart.

As the person, who loved Maedhros and Maglor more than his biological parents, he grieved.

Softly, the former Lord of Imladris says, "I can't fault you for the rejection. I _am_ a stranger to you and do not wish to pressure you with expectations to change this. All I wished for was to see your face, at least once, to have an image in comparisons to the tales I grew up with."

Nerdanel's red curls frame her face and even in the dark, she appears unhealthy and ragged. Like a person, who cares little for her appearances, who washes when the smell starts bothering her and who eats when she remembers her growling stomach.

She looks a lot like Maglor, had his father decided to wander through the world, alone and removed from any kind of human contact.

"I do not mind the connection between yourself and the people who raised you. I was not there, I can hardly judge you for whom you call your parents and who am I to deny a stranger a source of happiness when nothing of it is a concern to me?" Nerdanel turns for the first time and looks Elrond directly in the eyes.

The Peredhel catches a glimpse of the woman Fëanor had fallen in love with, who raised seven boys into great sons and now judged them for a few terrible choices they made at the end of their lives.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I have no memory of writing this, but I liked it enough to publish it anyway. Unfortunately I have no clue, where I wanted to go with the story.


End file.
